Representative Jeremy Trebas Knows As Little About Unions As He Cares About Firefighters

Republicans like to position themselves as the people who protect the interests of workers in this country and state, despite voting repeatedly to gut worker protections, undermine their health care and diminish their right to act in their own interests. While many of them try to keep their views quiet or only share them in the warm confines of an ALEC-sponsored meeting, a few brave, dim souls try to defend their anti-worker views.

In an online discussion with the Montana AFL-CIO, Great Falls Representative Jeremy Trebas displayed a breathtaking ignorance about the importance of unions in Montana and the country. Defending a future of getting paid less than the minimum wage so that Sillicon Valley executives can make billions, Trebas opened with an argument for “more flexible strategy” before jumping into a full-fledged attack on the union movement in Montana, one that ignored the simple fact that the protections Trebas and the rest of us enjoy in the workplace are the result of unions.

Defending his support for right to work legislation, Trebas offered this insight:

Really? Because I’ve never worked for a union and I’ve always had adequate rights. There is plenty of Federal, State, and case law to protect workers.

Those protections, of course, exist because of unions. Overtime pay, sick leave, family medical leave, safety regulations, the minimum wage, the 40 hour work week? All because union members fought tirelessly for them. The Gig economy might serve the needs of a few, but the vast majoerity of workers in this country can thank the labor movement for humane working conditions and decent pay.

Then Trebas went completely off the rails, displaying an ignorance of federal law before contorting himself into defending the indefensible position that he would still support Right to Work legislation despite agreeing that what he was defending would be incredibly unfair to workers.

A quick scan of that exchange shows just how out of his element Representative Trebas was.

It should come as little surprise that Representative Trebas doesn’t have the interest of workers in mind. Who can forget that he voted against firefighters diagnosed with cancer after serving the public, legislation so obvious that 46 other states protect those first responders?

About the author

Don Pogreba

Don Pogreba is an eighteen-year teacher of English, former debate coach, and loyal, if often sad, fan of the San Diego Padres and Portland Timbers. He spends far too many hours of his life working at school and on his small business, Big Sky Debate.

Has zero clue. Jeremy you really are like a lot of people on the National level when you know zip about a subject and you keep discussing it on a social media platform. I went through so much working for a non-union shop to the point that it was miserable. I endured work place bullying, the owner/employer never paid into my social security, I was determined to be an employee and he got away with not paying me wages owed. So, I would suggest you need to investigate things before speaking because you certainly don’t know what is going on. Please,do us all a favor and re think about running again as you have shown how little you know or understand.